Last week, I wrote about Brandon Farmer’s drunken ride on the back of a tractor-trailer. After traveling 17 miles on top of the truck, Farmer was eventually arrested and fined for his actions. When discussing the case, a representative from the sheriff’s office in Washington Court House, Ohio — where the joy ride began — was asked whether any charges were possible against the driver who unknowingly carried Farmer on his grain-hauler’s ladder.

The representative answered, as many people would have, by asking, “on what basis?”

Crazy enough, they had a basis: charges were possible on precedent.

Several years ago a Washington, D.C.-based personal injury attorney filed a successful suit after a child climbed aboard a tractor-trailer’s ladder and was injured after falling off. According to the court, the fuel-oil delivery truck’s safety feature was actually an “attractive nuisance” blatantly inviting children to come for a ride. The case even affected the American Trucking Association’s decision to forgo steps and handhold recommendations for vans and trucks.

Surprisingly enough, the tools that can make a driver’s job easier and safer — such as ladders — can become liabilities if the general public is hurt while climbing them.

Injuries associated with the transportation industry are even a focus for many personal injury attorneys. In fact, legal blogs, such as Trucking Accident Lawyer Blog, chronicle accidents where truckers are, or are construed to be, at fault. So, even if you aren’t the one who directly caused the incident, you are still at risk of absorbing fault in the public — and court’s — eye.

Of course there are negligent drivers. Of course mistakes happen. This fact is true in all industries.

But if you aren’t aware of potential legal minefields when you find loads, you might drive over one inadvertently.

Or, have one jump aboard while you’re busy hauling freight.